


Masquerade

by caldefrance



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Anal Sex, Clothed Sex, Community: theoldguardkinkmeme, Costume Parties & Masquerades, Crossdressing, Dancing, Disguise, Georgian Period, Hand Jobs, Historical, Kissing, M/M, Romance, Short Story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-14
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-12 02:55:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28753236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caldefrance/pseuds/caldefrance
Summary: Yusuf al-Kaysani studied the crowd that had grown to fill the King’s Theatre for a masquerade ball, looking for Nicolò di Genova. He’d not thought to ask about his costume, such was his confidence he could recognize his spouse no matter how he disguised himself.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 34
Kudos: 199





	Masquerade

**Author's Note:**

> This work was written in response to a prompt posted to theoldguardkinkmeme, which you can find [here](https://theoldguardkinkmeme.dreamwidth.org/8201.html?thread=2943497#cmt2943497).
>
>> “Ornate outfits. Atmosphere. Dancing. Scenery.”
>> 
>> “Give me a long-haired Nicky dressed to the nines & curly-haired Joe absolutely killin’ it in an ornate mask/suit combo.”

{image description: an eighteenth-century oil painting depicting masked revellers in cream-coloured court dresses embellished with filigreed details and dark coats, disguised with black silk dominos and ivory masks, overlaid by the following text. MASQUERADE INTELLIGENCE: In point of numbers, Monday night's masquerade was inferior to any former ones, but equal in insignificant dullness to what we have seen before. Harlequins without wit, men turned into women and vice versa, composed the whole group of above 600 masks assembled on the occasion.}

* * *

Yusuf al-Kaysani studied the crowd that had grown to fill the King’s Theatre in Haymarket for a masquerade ball, looking for Nicolò di Genova. He’d not thought to ask about his costume, such was his confidence he could recognize his spouse no matter how he disguised himself.

Yusuf was going husband-hunting.

He’d wagered he could recognize his husband anywhere. They’d met on a killing field, but if they hadn’t, he wanted to think they could have also discovered their remarkable connection if they’d met instead at a masquerade. They’d come to agree that they were blessed to have found each other, and when they played this game of seeking each other out among a crowd, they sought to recapture the magical feeling of the moment when they had found each other.

While he’d dressed soberly in a black silk domino cloak over his filigreed coat and a gold mask, he suspected the man he looked for had donned a more elaborate disguise. On previous occasions, when they’d played at this game, his spouse had disguised himself as the sun-god and the allegorical figure of justice and the many type characters from the _commedia dell’arte_.

Yusuf now looked for an _Arlecchino_ or _Pedrolino_ or _Il Capitano_ —the masked characters of the commedia dell’arte favoured by his Ligurian spouse—among the revellers. From his position at the eastern end of the assembly-room, he'd spotted a folk hero, two sultans, a shepherdess, and no fewer than three pairs dressed as Punch and Judy—but no sign of a tell-tale checquered costume or of a mask with exaggerated features.

Yusuf had teased Nicolò more than once that he thought his nose so distinctive, he could recognize him from that feature alone—no matter his disguise—unless the mask he used was grotesque. The fact that, no matter how he dressed or acted, his appearance would always be marked by the same distinctive nose had become something of a private joke between them.

Yusuf turned his attention again to the crowd of revellers, anxious to find Nicolò. He noticed tonight’s company was graced by the attendance of the Prince of Wales—Florizell, to his friends—and his mistress Perdita, disguised as a little blue-eyed nun of St Catherine. He did not doubt the gossips would feed the intelligencers all sorts of details about tonight’s gathering for the next day’s papers. With any luck, however, they’d overlook the activities of a sober domino and a harlequin.

For a few hours, or however long the revellers could stand the crush and roar of the ballroom, they were free to act as they will. The masquerades and carnivals held between the Christian holidays of Epiphany and Ash Wednesday offered them some respite from the rules and strictures of this society. They’d come to realise that for the price of an admission ticket, masked attendees could flout the conventions that split English society into separate classes and genders. Women could dress as men. Gentlemen could pretend to be labourers and swains. Demi-reps and princes could consort with prostitutes. Yusuf and Nicolò could dance together, in public.

They’d discovered that dancing, much like fighting, required the measured use of one’s body and careful attention to the actions of another’s. Dancers paired off, stepping and changing directions within a cotillion or square, to perform a series of figures in time with the music. They’d mastered all the figures and changes that were performed in combination during the social dances—the minuet, the rondo, and the allemande—and delighted in executing the difficult steps and hand-holds and passes at masquerades. They’d whirl about with the other couples in 3/4 time until they felt they needed to escape the crush and take some air—as well as a few liberties with each other.

Yusuf beat his foot impatiently to the triple meter of a minuet performed by a string orchestra at the other end of the hall.

 _Dove sei, uomo che amo_? Where are you, Nicolò?

Yusuf had just about made up his mind to move on in search of Nicolò when he spotted him—or, rather, her.

He’d spotted a female figure dressed according to the fashion of the day in a _robe à la française_ , an open robe with a _sacque_ back or pleats running from the neckline to the hem cut from silk dyed with ultramarine, worn over cream-coloured skirts and _panniers_. Her long brown hair was dressed with matching ribbons and strings of pearls so that a few loose curls fell attractively over the pale skin of her shoulders and chest that he could see was flushed in the heat of the ballroom. Her face was hidden from view by an ivory demi-mask and a silk fan which she held before her as she exchanged a few polite words with a swain.

He’d recognized her only when she’d lowered her fan, revealing a mole on her right cheek that he’d traced hundreds of times in his sketches.

Yusuf had only ever seen Nicolò dress in womenswear on a handful of occasions in the course of their relationship and the sight always made him feel flustered. His face flushed with heat when he saw how the stays and panniers that filled out the exaggerated shape of the court dress had transformed his lover’s figure. He marvelled at how a _modiste_ ’s contrivances like a conical bodice and rectangular skirts could transfigure a familiar body into a strange silhouette. He found it fascinating and monstrous and so handsome.

 _Bene, eccoti qui._ I’ve found you, _inamorato_.

Nicolò had disguised himself, Yusuf realized, as another character from the _commedia dell’arte_ —one of the lovers. Nicolò was suited to the lover’s role, Yusuf thought, as he too strived for perfection though more often than not his nerves kept him from outwardly expressing his affection for his beloved. The _Innamorati_ of the Italian stage were consumed with the idea of being in love, though the form demanded they express their affection indirectly, fighting and bickering for the audience’s benefit before reconciling and marrying by the end of the play. Yusuf took Nicolò’s disguise for a promise of how they’d end the evening and the thought made his heart flutter in his chest.

Yusuf made his way across the room, walking towards this familiar stranger, with a light-hearted confidence that came from having spotted his quarry.

“If you’ll excuse me,” Nicolò was saying to the man who wasn’t Yusuf, “there is someone that I’m meant to find.”

Yusuf's heart was pounding in his chest, and he had to force himself not to race as he closed the distance between them.

In another minute, he thought, they'd be reunited. Nicolò would turn to him and offer him his hand. Yusuf would take it and would never ever let him go, damn the impropriety. They'd feel again the wonder they'd felt when they'd found each other that first time. They'd get drunk on that heady feeling until the clock struck midnight and they'd have to make a quick exit before the masquerade ended with the customary unmasking ritual.

“I’ve found you,” Yusuf announced breathlessly, once he’d reached Nicolò’s side.

“ _Sono qui_ ,” Nicolò answered, giving Yusuf a private smile, even as he turned to offer him his gloved hand.

Yusuf bent over his proffered hand and pressed a chaste kiss to Nicolò’s gloved knuckles.

A beat of silence then fell between them as they stared at each other, studying each other behind their masks.

“I’d not expected to find you disguised as—”

“A moll?” Nicolò asked, using the familiar term attached to female sex-workers, as he withdrew his hand and snapped his fan shut as though he were preparing to use it as a weapon.

“Quite.”

“I’d not expected to find myself subject to so much _attenzione maschile_ ,” Nicolò confessed, speaking as was his custom with the added emphasis of an expressive gesture. “I’ve already fended off the obsequious attentions of a swain and a rake. They both seemed to think very little of my character,” Nicolò retorted, peevishly, snapping his fan open and waving it with his wrist to make the lace trimming of his _décolleté_ flutter attractively.

Yusuf barked a laugh to cover the sudden surge of desire he felt at the sight, giving a full-throated guffaw that was considered entirely inappropriate in mixed company and attracted a glare from a passing demi-rep disguised as a figure of virtue. He couldn’t do anything to hide the heat that coloured his respectably clean-shaven face at the suggestion the man he loved could be confused for a woman of pleasure.

Nicolò did not need Yusuf to fight his battles or defend his honour. He could very well put those he found ill-mannered and offensive in their places with a quiet word or a rap of his fan. He hardly cared about cultural mandates, in any case. If he’d mentioned the attention he’d received at all, it was in an effort to rouse him.

Yusuf knew very well how frequently others confused Nicolò’s subtle behaviour as brooding and mysterious, though his beloved’s character was anything but melancholy or splenetic. Other men only ever noticed his beloved’s spleen and not what he recognized as his gentleness and self-assurance. He’d vent his ardour in public if he could make them see his beloved as he did—as someone whose heart overflowed with kindness and passion.

And yet they frequented the masquerades to see and be seen.

“You look stunning,” Yusuf told Nicolò.

Nicolò pursed his lips, as though he were considering the merit of the compliment, but Yusuf could see his eyes shined with appreciation.

Yusuf offered Nicolò his arm then, and asked, “ _Signora_ , would you care to take a turn with me, away from the swains and the rakes?”

“ _Sì_.”

Nicolò took Yusuf’s proffered arm and followed him across the parquet floor toward the other couples forming lines for a dance.

They joined a group of six that were drawing up lines to dance a cotillion, like opposing armies facing off across an open field. Yusuf joined ranks with a knight, a cavalier, and a kind of diamonds; Nicolò, with a fairy, a queen, and a maid.

Behold, Yusuf repeated to himself, four kings in majesty rever’d and four fair queens array’d with softer powers. The music began and Yusuf imagined the parti-colour’d troops drew forth to make combat on the waxed plain of the assembly-room floor.

They joined hands and circled around, first in one direction and then, after sixteen bars of music, in the other. Then they separated, stepping and turning to execute a series of figures called for by the cotillion: ballance, rigadon, contretemps, chasse, pirouette, swing, promenade, and circle again like a carousel.

Yusuf and Nicolò held each other’s gaze all the while, as they met and touched hands for a brief moment before parting again as the rules of the dance dictated. Though the dance afforded them only fleeting touches, they kept gazing longingly at one another as they circled round and round. The two of them only broke eye contact when the dance ended and they bowed as the assembled crowd clapped politely.

Nicolò turned again to Yusuf, giving him a dazzling smile, when he recognized the baroque strains of the next dance. Nicolò's obvious delight led Yusuf to marvel again at his luck, to have been able to find and keep this man happy all these years.

Other couples joined the dancers when the orchestra began to play the more sedate strains of a minuet and they moved off to one side.

Yusuf took advantage of the repeated step of this courtly dance to look around. A promiscuous throng of various habit and various dye had assembled to watch them. Beyond the glittering crowd, Yusuf could also see glimpses of the resplendent wealth of the King’s Theatre on display: velvet hangings dyed a rich cerise, elaborate plaster work gilded with gold leaf adorning architectural columns, chandeliers hanging from the ceiling with hundreds of candles to light the space as the light faded from the arched windows set high on the walls. Such opulent surroundings made the sight of his lover on his arm all the more wonderful, he thought, as he admired the way the glowing candlelight made the filigreed details of his coat-sleeve shine when he reached for the other man’s gloved hand.

The allemande that followed the minuet required a hand-hold that was devilishly difficult and the concentration needed to hold the position should have cooled his ardour. And yet, when they stepped in tandem to the side and he felt the fabric of a dress brush up against him, the sensation of it made a _frisson_ of excitement travel through him.

Yusuf caught his lover’s eye again, Nicolò gave him such a heated look that it made his breath catch. He was reminded in that moment of the artist’s complaint, an injunction to look without touching, because he wanted nothing more than to take his lover’s face in his hands and kiss him soundly on his rouged lips.

Yusuf thought Nicolò looked ravishing tonight, and he could see how the others were looking at him, too. One man, whose dark mask covered all his face, was staring baldly at them as though waiting for an opening to ask a man so obviously taken for a dance. Another, in a pale demi-mask, wet his lips as though he too wished for a taste. Yusuf pulled Nicolò closer to him, feeling possessive, and his lover gave a breathy laugh as he was abruptly forced to alter his course.

Yusuf noticed then to his dismay that one errant lock of Nicolò’s hair had fallen from his _coiffure_ , as he found it incredibly distracting when it bounced against his lover’s bared clavicle. He spent the rest of the set wondering whether he longed to set him to rights or to ravish him instead and make him look even more disheveled. He didn't think he could wait any longer, not another hour and certainly not until the masquerade ended at the stroke of midnight. He'd ask to leave and they would repair to some dark corner or a disused corridor where he could take his fill of him.

They were both breathing hard when the music ended and they turned to face one another.

“I don’t suppose we could get some air,” Nicolò murmured, surreptitiously brushing the length of Yusuf’s inner thigh with the stiff boning of his fan.

Yusuf gulped, overwhelmed by another powerful surge of lust that made sweat roll down his back.

They were once again completely of one mind: they needed to find somewhere private.

“Come with me,” he growled.

They found a hidden door in the panelling of a wall, and no one paid any attention as a domino and his _inamorata_ slipped away from the masquerade.

The lovers ran, hand in hand, through the building’s dark corridors and half-lit galleries until hey reached the back of the house—the rooms where builders constructed sets and dressers clothed singers for the Italian operas that were performed at the King’s Theatre.

They’d had to try nearly all the doors, rattling the handles, to find one of the dressing rooms that had been left unlocked. Yusuf dragged Nicolò inside and pushed him up against the closed door. The room they’d broken into was little more than a closet and poorly lit, but it would suit for their purposes well enough.

Yusuf and Nicolò kissed, scarcely pausing for breath and without care for the way their masks knocked together, until they both felt dizzy with desire and hot under their clothes.

Nicolò moved his hands from Yusuf's tight curls to loosen the bow that tied the domino cloak around his shoulders, throwing the borrowed garment on the floor before tugging at the ruffles of the stock tied around his throat.

Nicolò’s elaborate disguise posed a greater challenge for Yusuf. He ran his hands over his lover’s _décolleté_ , searching with his fingers for buttons or ties that would loosen the fit of the dress. He growled impotently when all he could find were little bows, sewn onto the garment for decoration rather than for any real purpose. He’d just about decided to try and rip the stiff bodice from his lover’s body, when the other man rushed to stop him.

“Wait, Yusuf.” Nicolò enclosed Yusuf’s broad hands with his own.

Yusuf didn’t wait. He tugged at the man’s gloves, loosening them from his hands and then removing them altogether to reveal bare skin, before kissing each of his fingers in turn.

“The dress is fastened with pins,” Nicolò explained, breathlessly. “And there’s layers of undergarments underneath.”

Yusuf groaned.

“I can’t wait that long, either. And there's also the matter of getting dressed again.”

“Hitch up your skirts.”

Yusuf had shrugged out of his coat and rolled up his sleeves.

“Ah.” Nicolò flushed at the idea Yusuf was going to take him against the door like a moll and hastily rucked up the skirts of his dress. “Like this?”

Yusuf felt his knees go weak when he saw Nicolò’s legs were clad in stockings held up by ribbons tied into little bows.

“Tell me you’re ready,” he pleaded in a hoarse whisper.

Nicolò gave him a sign and Yusuf pushed him up against the door, lifting him at the waist. Nicolò hands were taken up with holding up his voluminous skirts, so he wrapped his legs around Yusuf’s back and gave a little gasp as he felt the other man align himself and breach him. Yusuf moved slowly at first, letting Nicolò adjust, until he could press another kiss to his lover’s lips.

“Good?” he asked, straining to hear the other man’s answer over the pounding of his heart.

“ _Sì. Tutto bene._ ”

Yusuf closed his eyes and concentrated on the sensation of Nicolò’s warm body around his throbbing member. He felt his lover’s hot breaths turn ragged as he began to move, pumping his hips and thrusting.

They both gave groans as they knocked against the panelled door, but they hardly cared for the discomfort while they were trying to relieve their ardour through the closeness of their bodies.

Yusuf only paused when he felt close enough, wanting to make it last. He looked over his shoulder, at the cluttered room behind them, and did stop when he saw their likeness in a reflecting glass.

Nicolò looked disheveled, with his long hair had fallen around his shoulders and his clothing in utter disarray. Yusuf thought he also looked mussed up, without his coat or his cloak and with his shirtsleeves rucked up to his elbows.

Their disordered appearance could easily be explained by the act they were engaging in, and yet he couldn’t help but think how different they looked from when they’d met. They kept fantasizing about the moment of finding each other, but in truth, they had made a decision to love each other every day since that moment. He couldn’t help but think that the sum of their choices had led them here, wherever here happened to be, to seek love in each other’s arms.

Nicolò’s voice eventually interrupted Yusuf’s wool-gathering thoughts.

“Don’t move,” Nicolò was saying to him. “You’ve a flea.”

Yusuf stilled his movements altogether, taken by surprise.

Nicolò leaned forward, to deal with the flee, and Yusuf didn’t think it at all odd that he would use his mouth for the task until his lips closed around his neck and sucked. Yusuf groaned when he realized that Nicolò had been teasing him for his inattention.

Yusuf shivered as Nicolò gave him a love bite and he couldn’t hold still any longer. He pumped his hips again, once—twice—and spent himself.

Yusuf pulled out and Nicolò found his feet again, though he continued to lean on him for support. Yusuf pulled Nicolò into his arms while he took his stiff cock in his hand, pulling and stroking, until he too reached his climax.

A moment of silence fell between them and they could hear the cheers and the laughter of the masqueraders below.

Yusuf's heart was still racing in his chest. They’d finished consorting and they needed to set themselves to rights before another amorous couple came along.

Nicolò wordlessly accepted Yusuf’s domino, covering his bare shoulders with the cloak, while he shrugged his coat back over his rumpled shirt. Yusuf also tried to help straighten the fabric of Nicolò’s dress over his panniers, but had to admit that nothing would set his _coiffure_ to rights again. They would have to hope that, as they snuck out of the King’s Theatre and hailed a hackney coach, no one would spot them and think to comment on their appearance in the next day’s papers.

“ _Pronto_?” Nicolò asked, once he’d donned his gloves again.

“ _Sono pronto adesso._ Where shall we go?”

“Wherever you’d like,” Nicolò said to Yusuf, his expression soft behind the ivory face of his mask, “so long as we go there together.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked this story, consider leaving a little note! Your excitement gives me the excitement I need to finish and publish my next story.
> 
> If you’re not sure what to say, that’s okay! ❤ are _great_. If you really enjoyed a particular line, you can let me know by copying it into the body of your comment. [I enjoy turning some of these lines into illustrations when I’m between projects.](https://caldefrance.tumblr.com/tagged/quote/) I also take reader requests! If there’s a small moment or an exchange between these characters that you would like to have seen, I might write a little fill for you and post it as bonus material in the comments. I may take a few days to answer, if I’m writing, but I try to respond to comments within a week.
> 
> You can also check out cover art and other visuals related to this story [here](https://caldefrance.tumblr.com/tagged/masquerade-story/chrono/). I post cover art, visual inspiration, and teasers for my published stories and upcoming projects on tumblr, @[caldefrance](https://caldefrance.tumblr.com/).


End file.
